Sounds of despair for Mark Hughes

MARK HUGHES had the weary air of a man forced to listen to a Leonard Cohen record on a never-ending loop when he faced the press yesterday.

QPR boss Mark Hughes has had a chastening time since taking the reins at Loftus Road []

“Same questions again?” he sighed. Well yes. Here is one the Queens Park Rangers manager would love to see the back of: When will your expensively-assembled team finally win a game? And if they do not do it today against Southampton, will that be the end for you?

Hughes repeated what he has been saying for several weeks now – that they feel they are close, performances are good, the luck will turn, one win will change it all.

Anything less than a victory today will leave Hughes in deep jeopardy, regardless of the supportive tweets from chairman Tony Fernandes that spring forth after each setback.

This game is simply huge. QPR are bottom with just four points from their first 11 games, Saints a point better off and the gap to safety growing.

Defeat is unthinkable for both sides. This is not the season to go down. With the flood of television money that will swill into the Premier League next season even the bottom club will trouser £60 million. But for the losers today, relegation will be a real threat even at this early stage.

We’re not happy with where we are and we shouldn’t be in this situation but we are

QPR boss Mark Hughes

“We’re not happy with where we are and we shouldn’t be in this situation but we are,” said Hughes.

“We’re not running away from it but it’s up to ourselves to make sure we get maximum points.”

How did it come to this? Saints were expected to struggle. But Hughes promised after last season’s final-day survival that QPR would not be in that position again (and they may not if they are already down before then). The squad was given not so much a face-lift as a series of major transplants. Nineteen players left and 12 arrived including former Champions League winning goalkeeper Julio Cesar from Inter Milan and Esteban Granero from Real Madrid.

Hughes has a squad packed with Premier League experience and today faces a team, with some players who two seasons ago were playing in League One, who have lost all five away games this season and shipped 29 goals.

Hughes has managed four clubs in the top flight over the past eight years – the first three with moderate success. Southampton’s manager Nigel Adkins has overseen 11 Premier League games. Ever. But for Hughes, this is no home banker.

“It’s an evenly-matched game in my view,” he said. “I don’t know about Southampton having less to lose than us. They have spent significantly more than we have.”

His caution is born of frustration – as each passing game heralds another opportunity missed. Hughes has to turn this around or his own career will be in turmoil.

He attracted a great deal of sympathy for his shoddy treatment by Manchester City, where he was making steady rather than giddy progress but was still sacked.

A move to Fulham proved he had the nous to deliver a top- eight team on modest resources. Then came the bold declaration that Fulham were not ambitious enough for him. For a player who wore the shirt of Manchester United, Bayern Munich and Barcelona, the hunger was understandable.

At QPR came the chance to build a club from the bottom up. He kept them up, just, last season. This was the time to push on. It has not happened – they have gone backwards.

A series of injuries to key defenders has not helped but cannot be used as the sole reason for such a wretched start. Hughes has not got the best out of his squad, several of whom have seriously under-performed.

He still believes QPR can finish in the top 10. Are Granero and Julio Cesar equipped for the relegation fight they find themselves in?

“Yes, absolutely,” he said. “They have come from clubs who are used to winning and to stay at those clubs you have to have a certain mentality to have stayed and played at those clubs.

“That tells you they have the attributes and qualities to be in a battle where we find ourselves. I’ve had the same experience and it is difficult but you get on with the job at hand.

“I went from [playing for] Man Utd, Barcelona down to Southampton and we had a shocking start to a season.

“But we turned it around. It was a shock to the system because it wasn’t what I was used to. But you use the qualities that took you to the top in the first place.

“Our hope was to finish in the top half. I still think that is a possibility. If I had been able to pick the same back four and same team for 11 games we would not be in this position.”

If we get to the end of the month without a Premier League manager losing his job, that will be a first. Both Hughes and Adkins will be hoping the history books are rewritten in the next 13 days.